News broke Sunday morning that Democratic presidential nominee and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton illegally tasked her maid, who lacked proper security clearance, with printing and handling classified information at Clinton’s residence in Washington, D.C.

According to various emails and FBI memos obtained by the New York Post, Marina Santos, was also given illegally access to a high security room in Clinton’s house that is known as a sensitive compartmented information facility, or SCIF.

The New York Post reports:

Clinton would first receive highly sensitive e-mails from top aides at the State Department and then request that they, in turn, forward the messages and any attached documents to Santos to print out for her at home.

The claim is backed up by several emails, including one from 2011 in which Clinton asked longtime aide Huma Abedin to “Pls ask Marina to print for me in am.” The Post does note that this email was sensitive but unclassified.

In a classified email from 2012, another one of Clinton’s aides told Clinton, “We can ask Marina to print this.” Another 2012 email read, “Marina is trying to print for you.” Santos would also grab documents for Clinton from the secure fax in the SCIF.

According to the Department of Defense, access to SCIF areas is limited to people with appropriate security clearances. As a former Air Force intelligence official told The Stream, “People without SCI clearances are not allowed in a SCIF without an escort by someone who has an SCI clearance and No Way are they allowed access to a fax.” In fact, all classified materials must be removed from view before the person enters. Clearly, such security procedures were not followed in this case.

The revelation brings even more evidence of what FBI Director James Comey referred to back in July as Clinton’s “extreme carelessness” of handling classified information, putting national security at risk. Some have expressed concern that the FBI has not subpoenaed Santos, a Filipino immigrant, or the iMac and printer she used — or even the printouts themselves.

The news came hours before FBI Director James Comey told Congress in another letter that despite reopening their investigation into Clinton’s emails last week, the Bureau has “not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July with respect to Secretary Clinton.” The agency said that the 650,000 emails found on a senior Clinton aide’s husband’s computer were either unrelated to the prior investigation or had already been looked into.

Daily Mail reports that “Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump blasted the arrangement on Sunday morning, telling a Sioux City, Iowa crowd that Clinton was ‘completely jeopardizing the national security of the United States.’” (For more from the author of “Report: Hillary Had Maid Illegally Handle Classified Information” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Black leaders slammed Hillary Clinton’s position toward the poor in a letter delivered to her campaign Monday, saying her economic ideas won’t help black communities in crisis and that her social views pose a threat to their religious liberty.

“Today in the United States more than ten million people of African descent face a crisis of catastrophic proportions,” the letter begins. “Life in our major post-industrial centers can be poor, nasty, brutish and short.”

More than 20 black leaders of the popular Pentecostal-Charismatic wing of the black church signed onto the letter, requesting a meeting with Clinton to discuss their concerns about her views on the economy, abortion and other issues. “We know that you will not make the political mistake of taking the 69,000 black churches in the US for granted,” they write.

First on economics, the signers outline their concern about Clinton’s motivations and policy ideas, all but accusing her of pandering for black votes. Federal programs have often “failed” the poor black communities they’re intended to help, they note. “It is not enough to make obligatory appearances at black churches, we need you to articulate a coherent policy for the black poor.”

The leaders then turn to the subject of abortion. “Abortion in the black community has had a catastrophic impact,” they write, saying they are “very concerned” about Clinton’s position on unborn children, particularly as it relates to religious liberty. (Read more from “Black Leaders Warn of Clinton Threat to Religious Liberty in Blistering Letter” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

It was around midday last Friday when FBI Director James Comey unveiled the October surprise no one expected — a letter to Congress announcing that the FBI was reopening its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a personal email server during her time as secretary of state. The FBI discovered more relevant emails — over 650,000 — during an investigation that was “unrelated.”

Later that afternoon, officials said the “unrelated” investigation was of Anthony Weiner — former congressman, estranged husband to longtime Clinton aide Huma Abedin, and currently undergoing investigation for allegedly sexting a 15-year-old girl. They found the new emails on his laptop.

The bombshell ignited bipartisan backlash against Comey, whom Democrats formerly praised for recommending no criminal charges against Clinton in July. It also revealed rifts between the FBI and the Department of Justice (DOJ), sparking speculation about Comey’s motivations and whether his letter would ultimately harm Clinton’s bid for the White House (a recent poll shows Trump and Clinton now virtually tied.)

Here’s the latest.

FBI Obtains Warrant to Search Newly Discovered Emails

The Wall Street Journal reported that the new emails were discovered weeks ago at the beginning of October while FBI investigators searched Weiner’s device for child pornography. Investigators couldn’t search the emails further without a warrant, since their current warrant only extended to materials relevant to the Weiner investigation. When it became clear that the emails were from Abedin’s accounts and sent to or from Clinton’s private server, investigators were given permission to dig deeper.

But last week, sources told the Journal, when officials asked for an update on the “Weiner laptop,” they “realized that no one had acted to obtain a warrant.” Investigators then allegedly confirmed that the emails could be relevant to the Clinton investigation and updated Comey, who sent the controversial letter to Congress on Friday.

Comey stated in the letter that investigators would be searching the new emails for classified information, though he did not know yet whether the emails contained anything “significant” (they could be duplicates of emails already reviewed by the FBI).

The FBI officially obtained a warrant to search the newly discovered emails late Sunday.

Comey Draws Criticism from Democrats and Some Republicans

From Clinton herself to GOP vice presidential pick Mike Pence, people across the aisle are calling on the FBI to release more information immediately.

On Sunday, a bipartisan group of nearly 100 Justice Department officials and former federal prosecutors wrote an open letter calling Comey’s judgment into question, stating that his announcement just 11 days before Election Day undermined the nonpartisanship that makes the U.S. justice system “exceptional throughout the world.”

The letter writers note that Comey’s decision — while not a breach of law — defies “prevailing Department policy.”

The letter ended with a call for more information:

[W]e believe the American people deserve all the facts, and fairness dictates releasing information that provides a full and complete picture regarding the material at issue.

Clinton’s Fault?

Since Friday, Abedin — who has worked closely with Clinton since she was 19 — and her estranged husband have come under scrutiny, with commentators wondering what role, if any, Abedin will have if Clinton is elected.

Others have noted that earlier this year, Abedin swore under oath that all her devices containing documents relevant to the FBI’s investigation of Clinton had been turned over — a claim that now seems questionable. Abedin now claims she does not know how her emails got on Weiner’s laptop.

While some have postulated how awkward it must be for Abedin to be involved in a political scandal so potentially detrimental to Clinton’s campaign given their longtime working relationship, others have asserted that the responsibility falls on none other than Clinton herself.

“The reason they’re in this fix is because Hillary Clinton inexplicably chose to have a private email server as secretary of state,” Susan Page, Washington Bureau Chief for USA Today, told CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday. She also said Bill Clinton’s private meeting with Attorney General Loretta Lynch earlier this year has proved problematic.

The Clintons and Lynch were criticized in June after Mr. Clinton and Lynch met on Lynch’s plane in Phoenix. Though Lynch claimed their conversation consisted of “grandchildren” and other “social” topics, it looked suspicious when the House Benghazi Committee’s report on the 2012 attack was released just days later. The FBI’s initial investigation into Clinton’s private email server was also ongoing at the time.

Lynch later admitted that the meeting had appeared questionable and recused herself from that investigation, saying that she would follow Comey’s recommendations regarding the outcome. Comey announced in early July that the FBI recommended the DOJ bring no criminal charges against Clinton.

Page said on Sunday that Mr. Clinton’s meeting with Lynch “made it impossible” for Lynch to stop Comey from going public with the reopening of the investigation, even though “we know from news reports that she was opposed.”

FBI vs. DOJ

Lynch wasn’t the only one who advised against Comey’s actions. According to sources cited by The Wall Street Journal, the DOJ and the FBI have long been at odds when it comes to investigating the Clintons.

Before Comey alerted Congress of the reopened investigation, senior DOJ officials warned that it would “violate policies against overt actions that could affect an election,” the Journal reported Sunday, adding that DOJ officials previously clashed with Comey over his public statements regarding the FBI’s Clinton investigation.

Sources also told the Journal that there was conflict between the DOJ and the FBI regarding how to investigate the Clinton Foundation.

Is Comey Getting Political?

Thought some of have accused Comey of playing politics, in a press conference on Monday, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest claimed that President Barack Obama considers Comey to be a man of “integrity” and “doesn’t believe that he’s secretly strategizing to benefit one candidate or one political party.”

Why did Comey make the renewed investigation public? John Podhoretz, editor of Commentary Magazine hypothesizes that the alleged disagreements between the DOJ and the FBI could have contributed to Comey’s decision. Perhaps, Podhoretz speculates, Comey wanted to cover all his bases lest he be “accused of complicity in a cover-up by the Republicans in Congress,” should the newly-discovered emails prove truly incriminating for Clinton.

Whatever Comey’s intentions, and regardless of whether the new emails contain anything “significant,” the ramifications of Comey’s letter to Congress are proving significant. With only eight days to go until November 8, the reopened investigation of the Democratic presidential nominee is dominating election coverage. (For more from the author of “New Clinton Emails: The Latest on the FBI’s Reopened Investigation” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.